Northside Festival: 06-16-11

by Carolyn Delvalle

The Northside Festival is a festival which showcases the greatest talents in multiple facets of art, film, food and of course music. There were so many shows listed that I wish I could have attended more of them but unfortunately the government decided to be a pain in the ass and send me to jury duty. Thankfully I escaped that assignment in 2 days without being chosen so to celebrate, I decided to go to a show which happened to be my first to attend solo.

On June 16th, 2011 I looked at a list of shows that were happening that night and after doing so, I wished I could have been in multiple places at the same time. Since that fantasy was short lived, I picked the show at Bruar Falls since from what I was told it was fairly new to the area.

The bands that played that night were Seapony, The Secret History, Reading Rainbow & Eternal Summers. I arrived to the venue a few minutes late & Seapony was already playing. After hearing them play for a few minutes, I instantly felt justified in choosing to attend this particular festival show. I enjoyed their entire a set which had a very good yet strange presence and energy.

They were followed by The Secret History for whom I did not care for since they were not my style. Their song God Save the Runaways had too much of a religious feel to it. Honestly it was almost like I was at bible camp. The remainder of their set was decent.

Next up was Reading Rainbow and as if their name was not awesome enough, their music was was well. Unfortunately after a tiring day at jury duty that lasted for 8 hours, I opted to leave the show towards the end of their set which means no Eternal Summers.

The venue itself being fairly new definitely needs some improvement. For one thing its practically summer and they had no air conditioning which is bad considering all the stage lights, and crowd packed into such a small space. To be honest, I am surprised but proud that I stayed for nearly 3 hours.

The crowd itself was not bad but if you are a faithful show goer, you know there is always that one person at a show that just annoys everyone. Unfortunately we had displeasure of having 2 guys jumping around and not even caring who they bumped into. A fight almost broke out but thankfully cooler heads prevailed.

In the end, I did enjoy the show and would go back to the venue if another show worth attending came up. Next year when the Northside festival rolls around again I plan on going to more shows then I did this year and hopefully the experience will be just as good.